The Simple Difference Between “Fall” and “Autumn”

According to the OED (Oxford English Dictionary, 2013)out of the first thirty definitions of the nounFall, all but one revolves around an object(s) dropping from great heights including meteors, rocks, and morality.

Photography Credit: TM Mulligan

Photography Credit: TM Mulligan

Photography Credit: TM Mulligan

Photography Credit: TM Mulligan

Photography Credit: TM Mulligan

Photography Credit: TM Mulligan

Photography Credit: Nate Kay: photography.net

Photography Credit: Nate Kay: photography.net

Photography Credit: Nate Kay: photography.net

Photography Credit: Nate Kay: photography.net

But the noun Autumn describes the inflaming deciduous trees and shrubs whose normally green leaves are recalibrated into an expression of a Creative and their vow of Life as seasons whether it’s the combustion of golds, reds, oranges, yellows, pink, magenta, black, blue, and brown or our conquering obstacles encountered, we, like our planet’s oft overlooked foliage experience similar change: birth, growth, death, rejuvenation.

The beauty of Autumn goes far beyond walking through mounds of leaves crackling like damp wood in a fireplace, hot apple cider, sweaters, pies, early dawns and even earlier dusks. Like a prepaid Visa card which is reloaded, Autumn returns each year and reloads us with hope and the stalwart conviction that all of Life is a set of Seasons, each with its own distinguishing hallmark which does, strangely enough, echo each of us.